THE VEGETABLE GARDEN 217 



of the North were those at which truck farming first became estab- 

 lished. The phenomenal growth of the great consuming centers of 

 the country has stimulated a corresponding growth and extension 

 of the food-producing territory, especially that capable of producing 

 perishable truck crops. The demands for vegetables out of season, 

 followed later by the continuous demand for fresh vegetables 

 throughout the year by the great cities, led first to the market gar- 

 deners located near the cities supplementing their field operations 

 by extensive forcing-house enterprises. Naturally, the products 

 from the greenhouses were expensive and available only to the few 

 who were able to pay fancy prices for green products out of season. 

 The improvement and extension of the transportation facilities 

 which came with the great railway-building era of the United States 

 made it possible to take advantage of the wide diversity of climate 

 offered along the Atlantic coast of the United States to furnish these 

 perishable products to the great cities of the North and East. 



Transportation facilities, together with cheap labor and cheap 

 lands at the South, have made it possible to produce in extreme 

 southern locations products out of season at the North in competition 

 with greenhouse products. The greater land area and the smaller 

 amount of capital involved in the production of crops at the South, 

 even though transportation charges were high, have enabled south- 

 ern growers to produce much larger quantities of the desired crops 

 than could be grown profitably under glass. It was therefore not 

 many years before lettuce, celery, tomatoes, radishes, beets, and 

 bunch beans came to be regular winter and early spring products of 

 gardens located at great distances from the centers of consumption. 

 -(Y. B. 1907.) 



It is only necessary to look around the village and town gardens 

 in the South to become convinced of the great need that exists for 

 information in regard to the proper care of the garden, and particu- 

 larly that part which is intended to give supplies to the table. There 

 town gardeners are very active in the early spring, and their enthu- 

 siasm often leads them to go ahead and plant a great many things 

 at a season too early for their safety, so that a return of cold often 

 compels the almost entire replanting of the garden. But with the 

 production of the early crops in the garden, the enthusiasm of the 

 gardeners oozes out under the influence of the summer's heat, and 

 the garden that at first looked so neat in its spring dress becomes 

 merely a weed patch. Few people realize the advantage that long 

 summers and sunny autumns give for the production of a constant 

 succession of crops in the garden, and still fewer realize that in this 

 climate the garden need at no season of the year be abandoned to 

 the weeds. One of the greatest troubles that results from the com- 

 mon practice of allowing the garden to grow up in weeds after the 

 first peas, corn, cabbage, and tomatoes are secured, is that these 

 weeds are the places where the larvae of the cut-worm hide, and are 

 ready to begin their destructive work as soon as the garden plants 

 are set in the spring. If the garden is kept clean and cropped con- 

 tinuously all the year round, as it may and should be here, there 



